The present invention relates to a shielded connector to be attached to a circuit board.
A hitherto known shielded connector to be mounted on a circuit board has a plurality of board-side terminals that are arranged in parallel to each other so as to contact terminals of another connector and that are all preliminarily given a 90° angle bend in order to align their rear ends to respective through holes of the circuit board (see; for instance, Patent Document 1).
A shielded connector 501 of this type shown in FIG. 5A is substantially made up of a main housing 503; a connector housing 505 accommodated in the main housing 503; an inner shielding case 507 that is accommodated in the connector housing 505 and that is formed from a conductive plate; a plug contact 509 disposed in the midst of a plug insertion space enclosed by the inner shielding case 507 within the connector housing 505 so as to contact another connector; and an outer shielding case 511 formed from a conductive plate so as to cover the main housing 503.
As in the case with the shielded connector 501, in a case where an entire shield contact is covered with the outer shielding case 511 for shielding purpose, the outer shielding case 511 can be made smaller by giving a 90° angle bend to a rear end of an upper terminal 514 and a rear end of a lower terminal 515, both of which are set in the plug contact 509, in agreement with through holes of a circuit board. Accordingly, there is yielded an advantage of the ability to miniaturize the shielded connector 501.
A shielded connector to be mounted on a circuit board is intended to pursue further miniaturization (see; for instance, Patent Document 2).
In a shielded connector 516 of this type shown in FIG. 5B, a plurality of terminals 519 have each contact portions 517 extending in a direction along which the shielded connector is inserted into and disconnected from another connector, and the contact portions 517 are disposed at a predetermined interval on a placement board 521. During insertion or disconnection of the connector, the contact portions 517 contact their unillustrated counterpart contact portions of the other connector. An unillustrated lock hole with which a lock of the other connector is to engage is formed in an upper surface of a shielding case 523 formed by bending a metal plate. The placement board 521 intended for mounting of the contact portions 517 is formed so as to situate on an interior surface of only one side wall making up a portion of an external wall of the housing 525. Specifically, the placement board 521 of a housing main body 527 is formed as one side wall that works as the external wall, and there is no wall opposing the placement board 521. This makes it possible to reduce a thickness of the shielded connector with respect to a board surface of a circuit board 513 in the right angle direction; namely, to make a so-called profile of the shielded connector lower.    Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Publication No. JP-A-H8-130052    Patent Document 2: Japanese Patent Publication No. JP-A-2005-158630
However, when only the portion (the placement board 521) of the external wall of the housing 525 is left in order to accomplish much further reductions in the profile and the weight of the aforementioned shielded connector 501, the thus-left portion of the external wall assumes the shape of a cantilever, which arouses concern for collapse of the cantilever wall to the inside of the connector designated by arrow “a” in FIG. 5B.